Posts

Showing posts from October, 2016
🌿 Share this page
The Weight of Firewood: African Women and the Cooking Fire

The Weight of Firewood: African Women and the Cooking Fire

The Weight of Firewood: African Women and the Cooking Fire Did you know the first ingredient in many African meals is firewood? In many sub-Saharan African countries most household energy comes from wood and charcoal, and women and girls spend on average about 15 hours a week collecting it, walking miles for a few branches. That is time lost from school, rest and work, along with smoke, injuries and danger. WHO survey data from 13 countries found girls in homes with polluting stoves spend about 18 hours a week gathering fuel or water, compared with about 5 hours in homes using cleaner fu…

Read more →
African woman farmer

She Feeds Africa

Before sunrise, after sunset, seven days a week — she grows the food that keeps the continent alive.

60–80 % of Africa’s calories come from her hands.
Yet the land, the credit, and the recognition still belong to someone else.

To every mother of millet and miracles —
thank you.

The African Gourmet

Feeding a continent

How coils of metal turned into meals on the journey to Ujiji

How coils of metal turned into meals on the journey to Ujiji

In 1871, Henry Morton Stanley led over 150 people into the interior of Africa
Polio, Disability, and the Architecture of Hunger in Kano

Polio and the Architecture of Hunger

Food & Disability
Water's cultural significance

Water's Cultural Significance

From Ancient Wells to Space-Age Filters

African Gourmet FAQ

Questions Readers Ask

What is The African Gourmet?

The African Gourmet is Ivy’s home for sharing, exploring, and keeping alive African culinary heritage, online since 2006. Here, foodways—ingredients, techniques, rituals, ecology, labor, and trade—are treated as a way into understanding culture. The site is a living timeline, bringing history and today’s kitchens together so you can see culture changing in real time.

Why "Gourmet" in the name?

The name goes back to our beginnings as a culinary anthropology project and to a value we still hold: discernment. "Gourmet" here means a careful, taste-and-smell-first way of keeping food traditions alive. We choose depth over breadth, giving each post—whether a West African stew or the political story of a cashew nut—the care and context it deserves.

How do you check your facts?

I check my sources, note where stories disagree, and credit the people who shared their knowledge. My aim is to go beyond a list of facts and tell each food's story carefully, in layers. You can browse the stories by theme in the Research Guide.

How is content selected and organized?

We choose what to write about by asking three things: significance, context, and enduring value. Each post is tagged by theme (Foodway, Ingredient, Technique, Ritual, Ecology, Labor, Seasonality, etc.) and must meet our sourcing standards. We aim to be specific—tagging by ethnolinguistic group, region, and nation—so Africa’s many food stories are never flattened into one.

What geographic and cultural scope do you cover?

Our hope is to keep food traditions alive across all 54 African nations. We especially want to lift up stories that are too often overlooked. You will find deep looks at major cuisines alongside small, very local practices that broader surveys often leave out.

How do you handle sources when archives are silent?

When written records are absent, we cite living practice as a valid source. We hold ourselves to careful standards: interviews are written down (with permission), practices are observed in context, and knowledge is credited to the people and communities who hold it. This lets us honor what can’t be held in the hand—sensory knowledge, oral techniques, ritual contexts—with the same care as a printed text.

Can researchers and the public access the site?

Absolutely. Everyone is welcome here. All 20 years of posts are searchable and organized for many uses: academic research, lesson planning, journalism, and your own learning. We encourage citation. For in-depth research help, please contact us.

How does this work ensure genuine cultural preservation?

By working the same careful way since 2006, we have built more than a collection; we have created an irreplaceable record of context. We keep not just a recipe, but the labor, seasons, and meaning around it. This long, patient commitment helps future generations understand not only *what* was eaten, but *how* and *why*, in all the richness of its cultural moment.